A New Ninja Way
by peppermint113
Summary: In a last-ditch effort to save her life, Sakura's sent back in time to before the Fourth Shinobi War. Lucky to have survived time travel with knowledge of the future, Sakura decides to become a traveling medic and try for a life of peace. Too bad a revenge driven Sasuke, overbearing Naruto, protective Kakashi, and interested Akatsuki won't leave her be.
1. Prologue

**A New Ninja Way**

**_Prologue: The end of an era_**

* * *

They were too late.

Sakura's body lay alone on the dirt, bloody and only recognizable by her pink hair. Naruto hadn't arrived yet, but the remaining original members of Team 7 and another ANBU stood by her. The scene in front of them looked disastrous. Chunks of the ground were torn apart and scattered everywhere. If you looked closely, you'd see some had been shaped into something resembling spheres using chakra. Sakura invented the technique by compressing ice during a snowball fight, which resulted in a ban from the annual fort building and snowball fight competition in the Land of Iron last year.

She appeared to have dislodged at least fifteen trees during the fight, some of which were in tiny pieces. Bloodstains were plentiful, a sickening red against the silty brown soil. Pieces of intestine were wrapped around part of a stick on one side of the clearing. The man who they once belonged to was staked on the remaining wood at least fifty meters away. Another body lay nearby. They had run by it on the way and saw it was ripped cleanly in half. The left side rested against a rock and the right side sat a few steps away. The head was nowhere in sight. The last person had been pummeled into one of the craters in the ground. They had yet to look in and see how bad he was.

The entire scene was something of nightmares. It appeared that someone thought of a few of the worst ways to be killed and tried it out on these men. It was so horrendous, even Tsunade wouldn't have been able to bet on the fights with ANBU, it'd too gruesome to watch.

For the first time in his life, Sasuke's vomit came up faster than he could comprehend. It splattered at his feet and threatened to continue if he didn't pull it together. Sakura was not a physically violent person by nature. Her teaching followed a strict regime which Sai had once summarized in the phrase 'a shinobi choosing to mend rather than end', yet the evidence clearly showed her superhuman strength and fighting style tore this place and these lives apart.

It couldn't have been anyone else. The physical mass destruction practically had her name on it. Really, there were few people known to destroy entire battlefields along with their enemies. While her time in ANBU changed the way she approached solo battles, there was enough evidence to pin every death and bit of destruction on Sakura.

Masking his horror, Sasuke looked towards his teammates. Sakura, Kakashi, another ANBU and himself became a team three months ago. Their team had seen firsthand what happens when you let the wrong people live and vowed to rid the world of as many as possible, but she was the level headed one between Kakashi, him, and their tiger masked teammate, and this was overkill.

Sasuke and Kakashi approached the body immediately. Tiger scouted the area. There was clearly no one nearby, not even a lingering chakra signature, but he knew the two needed time with her.

Tiger didn't exactly know her well, but she was their team medic and had saved his life multiple times. Discomfort etched across his body and Sasuke thought the man was debating whether or not to flee the scene in case he or Kakashi lost it. Sure, it would be treated as momentarily abandoning comrades, something Kakashi still installed in all of his teams, but Sasuke wouldn't blame the guy for trying to save skin considering the bloodlust and anger that radiated from them.

Kakashi was much worse. The woman he watched grow up was dead at 21. His body swayed for a second as he took at their surroundings and searched for signs of what caused this. He'd done everything he could as her sensei, even rejoining ANBU when he caught a peek at her tattoo on a mission. Sakura called him overprotective, but they had an unspoken code about this sort of thing. Everyone in the village knew Team 7 stuck together after the war with Kakashi in led. Sai took what they joked was early retirement when Ino got pregnant, which left only three of his former students in the field. Naruto was training to be Hogake, which left him as a temporarily sidelined member.

They still trained together. Hell, they still all went out together occasionally. They may all be capable adults, but Kakashi still thought of himself as someone to ensure their safety. They're his cute little genin-now-ANBU team, and one lays dead at his feet. He could smell Sasuke's vomit and briefly considered throwing up was the most human thing he'd ever seen that boy do. Frankly, he thought about doing the same but knew Naruto would join in if he arrived to discover the rest of Team 7 had thrown up. Everyone who knew Naruto from the bars was aware once he started he never stopped, and Kakashi was not in the mood to smell ramen filled vomit. No, he would keep his bodily fluids contained. Instead, he tried to think rationally.

He summoned Bull the moment he felt she was in danger. She was supposed to meet them an hour ago and was not one to be late. Bull was currently retrieving Naruto. Sasuke was having some sort of breakdown. Tiger didn't have a clue what to do. It was up to him to take action.

There were ways to revive the dead. They fought against once dead opponents in the past and had the scroll that made such a thing possible. Sasuke probably knew at least one way from his time with Orochimaru. The more he thought about the more he admitted that wasn't really an option since those who were revived weren't the exact same as the original, and he refused to settle for anything less. There was the life force transfering technique, but only Chiyo and Sakura knew how to perform it.

His mind was spinning faster than Sasuke's now activated Sharingan. They looked at one another as if to exchange words. She needed to be brought back quickly and there were too many questions. _Why hadn't she activated her creation rebirth? Where was her summons? Who had managed this in the first place?_ Kakashi couldn't let his mind wade too deep into that swamp. He had to focus on the body in front of him and reanimating it. Perhaps they could find someone to revive the brain and make her into a puppet. That idea was quickly nixed when he thought about how Sakura would react to discovering she was now stuck as a puppet. She'd probably turn them all into puppets as some twisted form of revenge, and he was not fond of life without his body.

Really, she would be the best at tackling this problem. Sakura probably had a thousand theories about how to bring back the dead other than forcing them into a new body. Kakashi was out of his league here. He didn't know any jutsu to deal with anything even remotely related to life after death. His medical knowledge was formidable in some respects, but this was far beyond his expertise. He knew they needed help, needed solutions, needed more than he could give.

Kakashi paused for a moment to acknowledge he was doing something that hadn't happened in a long time. He was panicking. It happened mostly at night after nightmares. One night Pakkun was sleeping on his bed and ended up being ejectected across the room. After that, and an intervention led by the pug, they decided any panic attacks should be confronted directly. Either with Pakkun or the one other person that could calm him down, Sakura. Clearly one wasn't an option presently. So Kakashi did the next best thing and called out the loyal ninken.

They made eye contact as Kakashi muttered three words the canine never thought he'd hear boss say, "Please, help us." Pakkun looked over and saw her body.

It was still warm, that was a good thing. But one look towards Kakashi and the Uchiha told him it was bad, really bad. He padded over to the woman who had made his pack peanut butter treats the month before and sniffed. She was dead, very dead. Her body would be cold soon and the blood pouring out of her wounds was flowing slowly. His ears turned down as he looked back and shook his head. Surely they knew she was dead before he had been called. What was he supposed to do?

One glance around at the people near her made him aware this was a desperate do all possible situation. Kakashi looked ready to kill someone. His hands were shaking slightly and his mask wasn't enough to hide the expression on his face. The Uchiha didn't look much better. Pakkun realized something at this moment that made his blood run cold. The girl smelled of the boy. She usually did, but this was stronger than the usual. Before he could stop the words from tumbling out of his mouth he told them, "She's pregnant."

If anyone other than Naruto had walked in on this scene they would've turned around and run as fast as they could for as long as they could. Naruto knew it was bad the moment he felt bloodlust nearby, but the second he entered the clearing everything got a lot worse.

Sasuke was kneeling on the ground crying. The great Uchiha, last of his clan, was next to a puddle of vomit, collapsed on his knees and holding Sakura's hand with tears streaming down his face. Naruto checked to see if he was trapped in a shitty genjutsu. Seriously, who would make Sasuke cry? That man was more likely to accidentally kill himself than be crying in front of others no less. "Kai." he said, followed by another, "Kai."

After assuring this was real, he looked at Kakashi-sensei. Sensei was shaking worse than that time they all tried a new party drug and collectively lost their minds for a night. The photos they found the next day showed sensei trembling and looking giddy, Sasuke's stoic appearance halted by the smirk that didn't leave his face the entire time, Sakura crying with laughter, and Naruto's eyes looking different directions. They later vowed to never take it again after realizing how vulnerable they could be to an attack, and because Kakashi continued to shake for a solid two days after until Sakura fixed his neurotransmitters that were damaged from overconsumption.

When Naruto walked into a similar scene of tears and trembling he entertained the thought that they had gotten high without him. There certainly was a lot of vomit. Maybe they took too much or maybe this was a bad dream or a shitty prank. Really, he knew these thoughts were a way to cope with the fact that killing intent combined with Sakura laying on the ground couldn't be from drugs alone. Naruto knew the second he saw them that she wasn't breathing, but he refused to do or think anything negative until confirming the dark thoughts slowly overtaking him. She couldn't be dead. She just couldn't. It was impossible by any standard; she was too good to be facedown in the dirt with no heartbeat. So Naruto continued to run toward them, trying to come up with other ideas.

Unfortunately, the truth was beginning to dawn on him. Naruto, now next to Sasuke, was close enough to them that Kakashi-sensei's movements were so easily detectable it made him slightly nauseous. As if the rocking of sensei's body was happening beneath Naruto's feet, he briefly explored the idea that he was on a boat being rocked by waves. Sakura must be below deck and her boys were suffering from some sun-induced fever dream. She'd be there soon, with her magical chakra and soothing words. Maybe they could get ramen once they made it back to land.

Sasuke broke him out of the daydream, croaking something that was both the best and worst possible thing he could say. "I'm a father, dobe." Naruto, still clinging to his boat fantasy and refusing to face the facts, softly replied "I always knew you had it in you teme,"

Kakashi looked at the two before another lapse of silence overcame them. He was supposed to be the leader. He needed to take charge, to do something- anything. Another one of his teammates was dead. The universe really did hate him. But this time was different because this time he was older, wiser, and had two of the strongest shinobi in the world as comrades. "Okay," he breathed, "we need suggestions. Fast."

The other ANBU quickly realized this was his chance to speak up before the others started to rampage. "We could freeze the body. It will provide more time to come up with a solution." this idea was quickly rejected with a mutter of something that sounded like fuck no and not effective enough.

At this point Team 7 broke apart to focus on their individual thoughts. Kakashi called out the entire pack and began opening every scroll he carried on his person. Naruto consulted Kurama. Meanwhile Sasuke… well, Sasuke wasn't in tip-top brainstorming shape and instead used these moments to silently curse every god in existence while simultaneously blaming himself and the bad luck that followed the Uchihas up to this point.

After a few moments, it was Naruto who spoke up, "We could use it... the mystery seal. Sakura said it can do the unthinkable."

"No," Kakashi quickly replied shaking his head, trying to ignore the sickness overtaking him, "we don't know enough about it. It could do anything. It's too risky in this delicate of a situation."

Sasuke rejoined the world at this point, throat raw and whispering, "She once told me to activate it if she was down and the world was ending. We may not know what it does, but the world is already over. I will activate it with or without your help."

Naruto and Kakashi made eye contact. Sakura didn't speak much with them about her relationship with Sasuke, but they knew the two had gotten quite close in recent years. If anyone had her best interests in mind, it was him. Deciding to go along with the idea, they each reached for a weapon to draw the blood needed to activate the intricate pattern resting on her body.

Seeing them grab weapons, the remaining ANBU decided it was high time to head home and report to the Hogake. Maybe he'd even swing by the hospital for a check-up in her memory. He took a few steps back right as the three men slit their skin and pressed their blood into the swirling mark on Sakura's back. Seconds later the body started to glow. Before the tiger masked man could even attempt to make an escape, the entire clearing shook. Light poured across every surface and with it everything in a hundred miles was scorched. Everything but the body that disappeared.

.

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	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: _The Dead Zone_**

* * *

Everything went dark the instant after her body flashed into existence. The world was briefly thrown into disarray. Birds stopped chirping, bees stopped buzzing, the wind stopped blowing. All things came to an abrupt stop.

Over the course of the next minute everything near her- animal, plant, specks of dust- vanished. Even the sun stopped shinning. Anyone in the area assumed it was a solar eclipse. What else could possibly bring about such darkness?

In the moments leading up to this, the world's natural balance of light and dark became skewed, and the body that appeared out of seemingly nowhere was encased in a sickly glow. She shone for that single moment, and then the darkness descended. A black, deeper than the bottom of the ocean and vaster than the galaxies above. Consuming and hungry, it enveloped everything in its path.

It was unnatural. The dying squaks of crows being removed from existence signified as much.

There is something rancid about certain types of darkness. Too much can make you mad, and too little all the same. This darkness was the type- the maddening, murdering, and impure sort. Contaminated, if you will. A poison so strong it knocked over everything in its path.

What was left behind, if you could call it anything, was a scar on the Earth.

It stunk of late-stage decay.

The lack of life would be unforgettable to all who would later cross its path. This darkness brought death never before seen; the only thing that could be considered close was war, but that was still recoverable to some degree.

The shockwaves went for miles, alerting anyone and anything nearby that something happened. Three villages near the edge of the area suffered earthquakes strong enough to destroy every single structure. It would take years for residents to get back on their feet. Initial reports suggested around seventeen people were killed, most travelers on the roads. This in addition to an unimaginable amount of wildlife and thousands of trees. It seemed as if everything within a hundred-mile radius somehow evaporated out of existence, leaving the land itself completely destroyed. It was pure luck the area was uninhabited by civilians.

Some people thought everything was incinerated, maybe an explosive jutsu went wrong. Those close enough to venture to the edge noticed there was nothing there, nothing left behind. Not a tree stump nor a skeleton, not even ash. No known jutsu was able to do such a thing. The most forbidden left at least behind something. It was as though the world decided to delete this place. The only thing left is the memories.

Search teams explored the area within hours of it popping into existence. Ninja from nearby villages were sent to gather information while scientists began to analyze the data in hopes that someone somewhere could find something to make sense of this thing. All the data contradicted itself, and search after search turned up nothing. Gossip spread faster than a tsunami, and soon it was dubbed 'The Dead Zone'.

Before lunchtime, representatives from all hidden villages decided to meet. They picked Konoha to convene. The members whose top choice delegates were too far from the location to get there in time were forced to send any able-bodied person to attend on their behalf. This was a historic event in the making, and days from now The Dead Zone incident would become a political nightmare.

In the present time, no one had made it to the center. Which coincidently happened to be the very place containing the focal point of this mystery.

There lay Sakura's body, still facedown in the dirt and unmoving. The dark coloured ground clashed against her pale skin and unusual hair. It was an image to behold. The pure unnaturalness would make anyone turn back for a second glance. Somehow the dirt had compacted so tightly it couldn't move. So while the wind blew, nothing blew with it but her hair. She was a beacon without realizing it. It's a shame every living thing was too far away to see she existed, see that she needed help.

Sakura felt the sensation of falling, but the air around her was not rushing past. Her mind tried to piece together the puzzle she was part of. She wasn't falling. It must be a mind trick, otherwise, her hair would be whipping around as gravity forced her down. So she lay there, in the decay of the Earth, and wondered what could result in her feeling this shitty.

After coming to the conclusion that she was not in fact plummeting to her death, one of her first thoughts was that she needed to get up off the ground. The ground is an unpleasant place to be, especially when you're body feels the worse it ever has and you can't make sense of anything. Her first few attempts to see were failures. Opening your eyes when they feel like they're glued shut is practically impossible. Then again, she always enjoyed being one to outdo those things labeled impossible. As Sakura poked around her body hoping to find strength, she had a harrowing epiphany. Her chakra was inaccessible. The panic she felt from this discovery caused the surge of adrenaline needed to flutter her eyelids.

As her eyes opened a crack she thought someone must've destroyed the sun. Either that or her consciousness was quite far from reality since the world was much too dark. Yes, it could be a solar eclipse, but we're the odds of such an event overlapping with her downfall? Eventually, her eyes began to adjust and her mind came back to itself. Slowly, she made out the blues of the sky and whites of the clouds the faded into her peripheral vision. Yet darkness still lingered against her skin pressing into the ground at the forefront of her vision. She couldn't turn her head to confirm, but it appeared everything around her was completely black.

Sakura woke up in what could only be described as a valley of death.

Her head felt like someone decided to break the bones in her skull and hastily force them back together. Whatever drinks and drugs Ino convinced her to take during girls night had clearly been a mistake. "_Ino-pig, what the hell happened_," she tried to mumble in the dirt, "_and why does everything smell weird_?" Sakura's body was heavy, too heavy she noticed. Sobering with that thought, she tried to move her legs and found it impossible. "_Fuck_," she attempted to say as she tried again and again to move in the slightest, followed by a long drawn out "_fuuuck_." Many attempts later resulted in the conclusion that any movement was impossible. She might be paralyzed. Sakura realized she couldn't even speak, every time she tried there were only small vibrations across her throat with no sound coming out. _What happened_, she wondered.

Everything hurt. She had no chakra, no way of moving, and no idea where she was. Further prodding around her internal systems caused her blood to run colder if at all possible. What happened to her seal? She couldn't feel it. Granted she couldn't feel much, and what she was able to feel was purely pain, but the seal has a signature she could always connect with regardless of how bad a state she was in- and it wasn't there. This was bad. Very, very bad.

Because her life was a cosmic joke of continued discovery followed by dissatisfaction, it wasn't surprising when she heard an unknown voice. She needed help, but unknown voices when you're down were always bad in her experience. It usually meant kidnapping in progress or bounty hunters. She was all too familiar with both since she and her teammates were now in the bingo book.

While she may have heard a voice, she could barely feel their presence which meant they were likely masking their chakra. Actually, she could hardly feel anything in the area. Most ninja would associate this with lack of sensor ability to no chakra access, but years of ANBU taught her to feel things nearby without chakra. Something must be seriously wrong with everything around her too, she mused. All charka in the area was radiating something like heat, or maybe that was her mind mixing it up with the feeling of her nerve endings on fire.

She decided to focus intensely on honing into the things around her and eventually associated the burning sensation she felt with one of poison. Maybe a poison bomb had gone off. It would make sense as to why she couldn't feel any life nearby. Although, if everything was dead why was she alive? And who has called out to her?

At this point, an undetermined but too long amount of time had passed. She had to do something. She was a poisons expert; paralytics and chakra suppressors be damned! Using what little strength she had, Sakura cracked open her eyes for a second time and focused on sensing movement in addition to noise as much as possible. Through the sliver of sight that started to get less blurry, she tried to piece together what the hell she was seeing. Her immediate guess was it was Halloween and kids were dressed in costumes not realizing the weight of what they wore. Another thing that came to mind was that Sasuke wanted to try some new sex thing where he wore clothes from their past. _Kinky_, she thought.

These were the only two reasons she could think as to why an Akatsuki robe-clad person was standing nearby. Further investigation and attempts to take in the world around her resulted in discovering it was definitely Sasuke. His eye-catching red Sharagin was activated. She could just make out the swirling tomoe when squinting.

Trying to speak was significantly harder than trying to see. Sakura's throat still burned. If her shallow breathes were any indicator, there was significant respiratory damage, likely affecting her airway. _What the hell had happened_ she wondered for what must've been the fifth time. And, _why is Sasuke just standing there staring at her? What the hell?_ She needed to get Sasuke's full attention. She needed to get immediate medical assistance- preferably from Tsunade-shishou.

Gathering every last ounce of strength she could find, Sakura forced her body to turn and tried to make a sound. All the while Sasuke continued to stare at her wearing that ugly cloud covered robe. _Bastard_, she thought, _sees someone struggling and just stares at them. And me, of all people! Someone ought to teach him some manners. I swear, when we make it back home I'm forcing him to talk to Sai about learning etiquette together. I mean- is he for real? Watching me lay here and struggle. That good for nothing, selfish, arrogant -_

It took a few minutes before she stopped ranting in her head and felt confident enough that she could mutter at least a few words. Dry mouth and half dead she struggled but was able to whisper, "S- su- Sasu-ke," followed by, "what the- tha fuck, what tha fucks going on?"

He moved closer to her with unusual swiftness. After years of her and Naruto begging, Sasuke finally got the prosthetic arm attached. It didn't erase the last few years of doing everything with one hand though. As a result, he lost a fraction of his ability to move skillfully. Only those closest to him could recognize his difficulty getting used to having two arms again. Sakura teased him about it during the first week after he knocked over a cup of tea with the arm swinging uselessly. He caught it of course, but it was still funny to watch him make a mistake. Probably one of the few mistakes he's ever made in his life, other than the big ones like betraying the village and trying to kill her and stuff.

She should've known then that it wasn't him. When this person moved there was no small shift as if they just remended there was a weight attached to their torso that took some getting used to. No, this person moved as if silent steps were second nature. He was in front of her and she hadn't heard a thing, much less the sound of a limb trailing slightly behind.

He crouched down just as she started to build up the energy to say something else. Staring back at her was none other than the mass murdered Sasuke once told her he wished to name their first son after. Uchiha Itachi.

So, things were worse than she thought. If her physical state combined with the vivid hallucinations were anything to go by, whatever poison was affecting her was taking its toll. She needed to figure out what parts of her were infected the worse and begin treatment. She needed her damned chakra. _What good is the Yin Seal if it can't save you from some wild mystery poison in your darkest hour?_

Her thoughts were once again interrupted when the voice that was suddenly in her face and definitely not Sasuke's smoothly asked, "What have you done?"

.

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	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: _Unexpected meetings_**

* * *

Sakura prided herself on many things. Her medical knowledge, inhumane strength, and ability to strategize, among other things. She's a tough, hard-working, and intelligent individual. This is why the noise she made when this man got in her face was not only embarrassing, it was a betrayal to her character.

She had brought people back from the brink of death dammit! She wasn't supposed to make girlish sounds like that! The shriek that escaped her was almost more surprising then what she saw. Her mind was working overtime trying to make sense of things. Itachi was dead, and she was hallucinating someone dressed up as the deceased Uchiha standing over her. She was alone, who knows where, and her brain decided the best option was to create a vivid replica of what may have been her future brother-in-law. _Great._

"You're not real." she blurted out, suddenly regaining enough strength to speak.

"I'm not?" he retorted, looming over her.

_Even better, it talks_, she thought.

"No, I'm just imaging you for some reason. I'm not sure why my mind would pick you specifically. At times like this, you would think I'd conjure up someone comforting- no offense Itachi-san."

"None taken."

"So... I guess... maybe you help me out here? I know you're a figment of my imagination, but my subconscious must have an idea about what to do now. I guess you might know something or can gather intel as an extension of me." she questioned, "My chakra is blocked. I can't feel the seal either. If I didn't know any better I'd say I was dead. I'm not dead right?"

"No."

"Good. That's good. Okay, so what do we know. Lay it on me."

She waited for him to reply, but the illusion just looked at her. Slow seconds went by and his lack of response was beginning to piss her off. He was her mind's creation, the least he could do is provide some assistance!

"Well," she started, "no need to rush. It's not like my entire body is numb and potentially on the verge of dying alone or anything."

"You're not alone."

"A hallucination doesn't count."

"And if I was real?"

"I don't have time for this existential shit right now. Can you help me out or what?"

"What would you have me do?"

"Survey my injuries. Scope out the area. Tell me what you see."

"You have lost a large amount of blood. There is nothing nearby."

"Where are we?"

"Fire country, near the border."

_Fire country_, she mused,_ I was tracking those nukenin near Hidden Grass. Three dead. The fourth one was tricky with his stupid disappearing act. We must've crossed the border at some point. I activated my seal at some point to protect the baby when he stabbed me. I may not be able to feel the seal or the baby but I think blood from the stab wound is why the ground feels so wet. Damnit. I hope he's dead at least_.

"Is there a body nearby. Man, brown hair, around Naruto's height?"

"Everything around us is charred."

"I burned him?" she exclaimed, surprised that she caused the damage around them. Over the last few years she made an attempt to learn more fire and water related attacks, but usually her land destroying moves involved the trademark super strength. She had wanted to diversify her skills, plus Sasuke and Kakashi had some sort of competition about who could teach her the most. She never burned down an entire landscape before; Sasuke would score some major points over Kakashi for this.

"No." he replied.

"Is he alive?"

"You misunderstand. There is nothing alive around us."

"Oh, good. I got them all then. Too bad we ruined this part of the woods. Any chance you remember how that happened? "

"I wouldn't know. I was not there."

"Sure, hallucination-san. Whatever you say. It's not as if you're a part of my mind or anything." she bit back, "Moving on, if there are no immediate threats in the area then we should discuss how I'm going to get out of here. If I'm not mistaken, the wound on my stomach is still bleeding. At this rate, we're going to succumb to unconsciousness so let's make a game plan before that happens."

The next few minutes consisted of an annoyed Sakura debating with her own mind. Who knew her brain thought of Itachi as this infuriating? Everything she asked he took too literally. It was like the guy was intentionally trying to piss her off. He didn't seem to care that she was dying, hallucination aside, he had no sense of self-preservation. He was her mind's creation, and if she died so did he. She told him as much and he seemed to think this was funny, which made her even angrier. All the while more blood was seeping out of her wound into the ground.

"Enough fooling around Itachi." she snarled, "In case you haven't caught on yet, we're in a serious situation."

"What happened to the honorific?"

"You're my hallucination. I'll call you what I damn please. Maybe I'll even call you after your stuffed rabbit." she joked.

At this, he turned serious. Before she could blink he was emitting killing intent and much too close for comfort. Even though he wasn't real, it still made her uncomfortable.

"Who told you that?" Itachi asked seriously.

"Who do you think?" she blinked, "Obviously Sasuke-kun."

"You lie. Sasuke would never share such a thing."

"What are you talking about? We share everything. I know more about you than anyone else other than him. I know your favorite colour was green. Your first crush was on a girl that died during the war. Sasuke-kun once spent an entire afternoon telling me stories about you. He really loves you. Of course, we share these things." she said matter of factly.

The next few things that happened were difficult to make sense of. Whether she was dreaming or not remained up for debate. If she was not, then it appeared the illusion had somehow managed to make physical contact with her and was carrying her. _How odd_.

It wasn't until the black ground turned dirt brown again that suddenly things started to click into place. This was not her mind making stuff up. There was a living breathing person carrying her. Someone who spent more time making remarks than actually offering any help. The only people who would do such a thing were Uchiha. The last thought she had before passing out was of blood loss and this Itachi illusion.

* * *

Sakura woke up for the second time in a state of shock. The first thing she noticed was that her wounds were dressed. The second was how cold this room was. She could feel herself shivering. She didn't remember much. There was a battle, lots of blood, her imagining Itachi wearing Akatsuki robes, being carried, and now being here. She immediately surveyed her surroundings and realized she was underground in a simple room. Beneath her lay a decent futon surrounded by comfy looking pillows. There was a black ink painting of a willow tree adjacent to the wall she was leaning against. The door was closed. She was in an old Akatsuki hideout.

There were two options she could think of, either someone was holding her hostage or today was Friday.

Sasuke and Sakura had a simple agreement to either poison or drug one another the first Friday of every month. Sometimes role play was involved. Sometimes they would spar first and hide it in their weapons. That often ended with Sasuke transporting them and Sakura cleaning up bloodstains the next morning. Regardless of the build up, Fridays always ended in sex.

The first time it happened was an accident during an A-class mission to Rain. They both got dosed with a fast-acting poison after an intense fight that involved acid rain and lab experiments gone wrong. They briefly thought death was imminent. The sex that followed during the hours after Sakura figured out the antidote was great, and so their little game of finding new things to give to the other was born. It was exhilarating.

Still, this was going too far. He must've fucked up calculating the potency because Sakura had genuinely thought death was too close for comfort at some point.

Sakura eventually settled on the idea that this had to be some sort of sex thing. Destroying that much land and engaging in witty banter while she was on the brick of death was not the usual route of kidnappings. _Sasuke must've dressed up as Itachi as part of it, right?_

She wasn't sure what to make of this, but it was even more uncomfortable in such a chilly room.

At some point 'Itachi' returned, a glass of water in hand. The feeling of freshwater against her throat was heavenly. She quickly gulped down the glass before demanding another, and another after that. He continued to pour them for her without saying anything, albeit he looked a bit uncertain. What gave him the right to look at her like that? It was his fault she felt this shitty for dosing her with whatever shit this was.

"Alright," she said, "drop the henge Sasuke, it's too weird. Even for us." The Itachi lookalike said nothing as he continued to stare at her. "I get it. You want to try out something new. That's fine. But the least you could do is give me a little warning. Cleary you messed up the ratios because I feel worse than the time Sasori ran his sword through me. Also, I swear to Kami if you overdid it intentionally to swoop in and play hero I'm not buying any tomatoes for a month. We've talked about this. Naruto is the hero among us and I've never hero worshipped him, so I'm not going to start with you. If you need an ego boost then go talk to some of your fangirls. Don't do it during our experimental sex time."

She lectured him as Sasuke continued to look at her with an unreadable expression on his face. Sakura scoffed. At the very least, he better be getting off on this, otherwise what was the point?

Sakura glanced at him and sighed, "When did you even find the time to fix up one of the old Akatsuki hideouts? Seriously, this is too much and totally out of the blue. What was the intention? You swoop in and save me, oh- or better yet, would you pretend to be the bad guy again and I your hostage?" she questioned. "I admire the dedication, but with the money it must've cost to fix this place up we could've gone on vacation. I still wanna go to that onsen Hinata was talking about!"

Finally, Sasuke broke the silence, "You seem to have me confused."

Sakura wanted to laugh at this point. His commitment to the role was admirable, but she wasn't into the whole Uchiha thing right now. How was Sasuke even dealing with this? The emotional stress he must be putting himself through was phenomenal to try and have sex dressed as his brother. Really, this was beyond.

"Okay, I'm calling safe word. Grapefruit. Now please talk to me. Explain what you gave me to lock my chakra like this and why you want us to have sex dressed like your brother. I admit being into the tall, dark, and handsome thing but fucking your dead sibling is overdoing it."

It was with a startling realization that Sakura jumped up and yelled "Fuck! Fuck, Sasuke! Siblings! Fucking... siblings! Did you even bother to look into the interactions of whatever you gave me with female anatomy? Fuck! Shit! Motherfucking - Oh Kami… I didn't want to tell you like this but you've back us into a corner. Shit, I'm sorry. I should've told you sooner. I'm so sorry. I didn't think we do this Friday because of your mission. I planned to tell you when you got back. This is a disaster…" Sakura continued rambling as she walked in circles and nervously started to fidget.

"Tell me." he interrupted.

"I'm- I'm pregnant. I only just found out. It's a few weeks along."

"You're pregnant?"

"Yes."

"Sasuke is going to be a father?"

"Well… maybe. Considering the strength of whatever you gave me I'd say it's 50/50 as to whether the pregnancy is still viable. My seal may have protected it without me knowing, but the fact that I can't feel my chakra isn't a good sign. Frankly, the odds are against us. Also, don't speak in the third person, it's super weird. I called grapefruit okay- grapefruit, yeah? So put a pause on this little fantasy of yours and help me figure out what's blocking my chakra pathways!"

"You require medical attention."

"No shit!" she exclaimed, extremely frustrated at his handling of this whole thing. Using what little chakra she had, Sakura angrily started channeling it towards her fist wrapped about the empty glass, which then burst into bits. Having used what little energy she regained, Sakura fell unconscious seconds after the glass shattered.

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A/N Hi! I'm back! The semester started a few weeks ago and things have been crazy busy for me. This is my last year before graduation so I won't have a ton of time to update. Really appreciate all the reviews and support. Didn't wanna leave ya hanging so decided to split chapter 2 in half and upload this part which has been done for a while. Thinking I'd do short chapters in order to update more often. I tend to post late nights when I'm avoiding being productive and don't usually want to proofread/have a beta, so if you find any spelling errors or think something doesn't make sense feel free to call me out on it so I can make changes. Hope you enjoy :)


	4. not an update- question for readers

Hi yall, I hope you're doing okay. I'm alive and plan to revise this/add to it in the coming months, please bear with me.

Quick question, would you rather have this story be more about 1. personal growth/sakura going on adventures or 2. romance/family

I'm sorta planning both rn but appreciate input from the folks who are still interested in this. Thank you:)


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